{"id":561,"date":"2020-11-05T16:28:32","date_gmt":"2020-11-05T16:28:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/?p=561"},"modified":"2025-06-05T15:29:41","modified_gmt":"2025-06-05T14:29:41","slug":"decoding-your-reading-list","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/decoding-your-reading-list\/","title":{"rendered":"Decoding your reading list"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>In the past few weeks you have probably been presented with module handbooks for everything you&#8217;re studying, with a list of references to things you are being told to read. Sometimes these will all be in the same referencing style and formatted in a way that you can understand easily what type of information it is. But sometimes, it might be more tricky to work out what exactly it is you are looking for. You can find yourself searching for a journal article, only to discover that it&#8217;s a book chapter, and you&#8217;ll never find it in a journal database.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you are feeling a bit confused by your reading list, don&#8217;t worry. It&#8217;s a common problem and decoding references does get easier as you become more familiar with the referencing conventions of your subject.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There are some easy things to look out for in your references that will help you identify what type of information it is, and the key details, such as the author and title, that you would need to use in order to find it successfully. Take a look at the examples in the gallery to see what to watch out for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-group\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large is-style-default\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide1-1024x576.jpg\" alt=\"Reference for a book in the Harvard style with the title in italics.\" class=\"wp-image-4591\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide1-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide1-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide1-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide1.jpg 1280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 767px) 89vw, (max-width: 1000px) 54vw, (max-width: 1071px) 543px, 580px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide4-1024x576.jpg\" alt=\"Reference for a book chapter in the Harvard style which includes the chapter and whole book title. \" class=\"wp-image-4593\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide4-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide4-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide4-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide4.jpg 1280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 767px) 89vw, (max-width: 1000px) 54vw, (max-width: 1071px) 543px, 580px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide2-1024x576.jpg\" alt=\"Reference for a journal article that includes the article title, volume and issue of the journal. \" class=\"wp-image-4592\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide2-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide2-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide2-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide2.jpg 1280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 767px) 89vw, (max-width: 1000px) 54vw, (max-width: 1071px) 543px, 580px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide5-1024x576.jpg\" alt=\"Reference for a website in harvard style which includes a url and accessed date. \" class=\"wp-image-4594\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide5-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide5-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide5-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2020\/11\/Slide5.jpg 1280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 767px) 89vw, (max-width: 1000px) 54vw, (max-width: 1071px) 543px, 580px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>Your reading list is also linked from your module course on Canvas. Individual items on your reading list will link through to <a href=\"http:\/\/libsearch.ncl.ac.uk\">Library Search<\/a>, showing you print book availability and linking to e-book and e-journal full text wherever possible. This means you wont need to do a separate search.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Find out more about reading lists on the <a href=\"https:\/\/ncl.ac.uk\/library\/resources-and-study-support\/databases-journals-reading-lists\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Library website.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the past few weeks you have probably been presented with module handbooks for everything you&#8217;re studying, with a list of references to things you are being told to read. Sometimes these will all be in the same referencing style and formatted in a way that you can understand easily what type of information it &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/decoding-your-reading-list\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Decoding your reading list&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7206,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[114],"tags":[43,44,45,10,26,46,36,2,18,50,4,27,52,28,95,53,29,54,23,22,56,57,21,11,16,30,17,9,62,63,65,66,12,13,39,6,70,100,33,34,19,42,24],"class_list":["post-561","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-top-tips","tag-agribusiness","tag-agriculture","tag-animal","tag-archaeology","tag-architecture","tag-biology","tag-biomed","tag-business","tag-chinese-and-japanese","tag-civil","tag-classics","tag-combhon","tag-countryside","tag-communication","tag-culture-and-heritage","tag-earth","tag-education","tag-eee","tag-english-language","tag-english-literature","tag-environeng","tag-environsci","tag-film","tag-art","tag-french","tag-geography","tag-german","tag-history","tag-marinesci","tag-marinetech","tag-maths","tag-mecheng","tag-media","tag-music","tag-nutrition","tag-philosophy","tag-physics","tag-planning-and-landscape","tag-politics","tag-sociology","tag-spanish-and-latin-american","tag-sport","tag-translating-and-interpreting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/561","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7206"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=561"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/561\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7432,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/561\/revisions\/7432"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}